Hallucinogens Have Doctors Tuning In Again

[massrock]

Is that a criticism of 'Zen' zhao?

Do you think it's fair to say that was a result of some kind of huge misappropriation, or a problem with taking things out of context*. Or rather that fascist ideologues found ways of interpreting certain Zen notions that bolstered or offered them justification for how they were coming to see the world and what they wanted to do.

As for the assimilation of a nation, well certain conditions were in place (I suppose we're talking about Germany) and those guys did understand something about the psychology of that, but only in a very limited and tragic way of course.

But anyway, I think it's fair to say that if someone has genuinely experienced themselves as the greater whole, and integrated the experience correctly, or rather integrated their ego correctly, that experience is not up for co-option at all. The mass of the German people in the 1930/40s had presumably not had that experience but were being led by semi-clever people who did at least have some knowledge of the darker sides of human psychology (that being where they were living) and how to manipulate it.

* I mean maybe something like (for example) an insistence on the absence of certain moral truths has an original developmental context where it's balanced with other Buddhist ideas.

 

[droid]

My point is that the profound experiences of gratification and life-affirmation hallucinogens undoubtedly provide.

?

Not sure what hallucinogens you've been taking, and everyone's experiences are different of course, but I cant really agree with this summary at all... One of the things that strikes most LSD users is how a tiny chemical change in their brain can fundamentally alter their perception and thought processes, and as a result how insignificant and subjective 'personality' is to begin with... having your mind taken to pieces and reassembled is not really 'gratifying' or particularly 'life affirming' IMO, in fact this process is what causes so much damage to those who abuse psychedelics. Psychedlics aren't like ecstasy, the experience stays with you...

What individuals may treasure as a "life-changing revelation", is, in fact, just routinely prescribed palliation against prevalent depression which naturally arises from the meaninglessness of life in consumerist society

I haven't meant to make any Leary type claims here, but I have to say that this strikes me as both proscriptive and extremely dismissive of individual experience.

 

[Mr. Tea]

My point is that the profound experiences of gratification and life-affirmation [something] undoubtedly provide, can very well be integrated in the diversion machinery of Capitalism.

OK, I see what you're saying. But the trouble is, pretty much anything worthwhile can be substituted for [something] in that sentence, can't it? Art, music, intellectual discourse, sex, child rearing, food, religious worship, humour, sport...see what I mean? Taken to its logical conclusion, you might as well just kill yourself.

Edit: and (again) I agree with droid - real psychedelic episodes are typically extremely challenging, even deeply traumatic, albeit in a way that can be beneficial or 'healing' in the long run. I think ecstasy is psychedelic too, mind, although in a different way from acid or mushrooms. I really don't see how it's in any way conducive to capitalism or consumerism. Who comes round from a trip convinced they need a faster car or a bigger TV?

 

[massrock]

My point is that the profound experiences of gratification and life-affirmation hallucinogens undoubtedly provide, can very well be integrated in the diversion machinery of Capitalism. What individuals may treasure as a "life-changing revelation", is, in fact, just routinely prescribed palliation against prevalent depression which naturally arises from the meaninglessness of life in consumerist society.

There is that, but as droid and tea say, a psychedelic experience can go beyond that.

Mind you, I would also say that those experiences are available without drugs, but drugs can be a much quicker route if you need convincing.

 

[massrock]

Just as meditation and yoga, originally aiming at leaving all worldly affairs behind, are now used by all kinds of yuppies as relaxation techniques to become even more efficient.

This isn't true.

Of course you can use meditation and yoga for relaxation, that's great - no bad thing in my book. But these things are not, and never were about 'leaving all worldly affairs behind.', at all. There are much quicker and easier ways of doing that if that's what you want to do!

 

[droid]

Who comes round from a trip convinced they need a faster car or a bigger TV?

TBF, If you've spent your trip playing Starwing or SFII on the SNES, or driving around on the beach in the middle of the night like a lunatic while your friends cling to the roof laughing manically (I nearly died btw), then you might come to these conclusions.

 

[massrock]

I think ecstasy is psychedelic too, mind, although in a different way from acid or mushrooms. I really don't see how it's in any way conducive to capitalism or consumerism. Who comes round from a trip convinced they need a faster car or a bigger TV?

I think E can be good on a sort of emotional therapy level but I'm not sure if it can ever really 'take you to the other side' by itself. Along with 8-12 hours of dancing, yes. But all those profound experiences really don't have anything to do with the drugs as such, the drugs just help you to get out of the way so they can happen. Something like that.

 

[Mr. Tea]

TBF, If you've spent your trip playing Starwing or SFII on the SNES, or driving around on the beach in the middle of the night like a lunatic while your friends cling to the roof laughing manically (I nearly died btw), then you might come to these conclusions.

Haha, everything comes back to SFII in the end, doesn't it? The Great Leveller.

Edit: yes massrock, very true - that's why I talked about the kinds of experience psychedelics can "catalyse", not "produce". Set'n'setting maaan, set'n'setting!

 

[massrock]

Can I mention this here: http://thespiritmolecule.com/gDMT.html

 

[nomadthethird]

This just in: Scientists use organic compounds that they developed and refined in the first place in order to regulate neurochemistry! Holy o chem batman!

This is not new, nor is it very surprising. LSD or any dopiminergic compound is going to have excellent potential for the treatment of idiopathic/neuropathic pain.

 

[nomadthethird]

OK, I see what you're saying. But the trouble is, pretty much anything worthwhile can be substituted for [something] in that sentence, can't it? Art, music, intellectual discourse, sex, child rearing, food, religious worship, humour, sport...see what I mean? Taken to its logical conclusion, you might as well just kill yourself.

^This. And- oh please.

Denying people medical treatments that work because it is going to tarnish the aura of authenticity you imagine surrounds your recreational drug experience is -- about as selfish and ludicrous as anything I've ever heard in my life.

It's about as logical as saying homosexual marriage is going to ruin straight marriage.

I suppose addicts shouldn't get methadone because that might make the wholesome heroin experience less fucking romantic for junkies.

Epic. Fail.

 

[nomadthethird]

Why wouldn't psychedelics survive the pharmacological reappropriation of substances that were cultivated as medicine to begin with. Yup, that's even before contemporary Europeans "discovered" that it's a good time of a Friday night.

How about ecstasy? This was a drug developed by the medical community that was then appropriated for recreational abuse. But I guess that's ok... the reverse isn't...

 

[massrock]

This just in: Scientists use organic compounds that they developed and refined in the first place in order to regulate neurochemistry! Holy o chem batman!

I don't think scientists developed psilocybin.

But the news here is that they are once again allowed to research the use of those compounds and are doing so in a sensible way, no?

This is not new, nor is it very surprising. LSD or any dopiminergic compound is going to have excellent potential for the treatment of idiopathic/neuropathic pain.

Maybe that's one way it works. Can you get a prescription for it?

 

[nomadthethird]

I don't think scientists developed psilocybin.

But the news here is that they are once again allowed to research the use of those compounds and are doing so in a sensible way, no?

Maybe that's one way it works. Can you get a prescription for it?

Psilocybin is the 'active ingredient' in mushrooms. But you can synthesize it in a lab, and plenty of people have/do.

People were using psilocybin, ayahuasca, yage, marijuana, etc., as medicine for thousands of years, long before capitalism was around.

 

[massrock]

I know all those things. In fact that means people were using psilocybin before scientists were around, depending on your definition. I suppose shamans were probably the first scientists.

You said :

This just in: Scientists use organic compounds that they developed and refined in the first place in order to regulate neurochemistry! Holy o chem batman!

Am I just being pedantic in saying that scientists didn't develop psilocybin?

(I'm all for it btw)

 

[droid]

^This. And- oh please.

Denying people medical treatments that work because it is going to tarnish the aura of authenticity you imagine surrounds your recreational drug experience is -- about as selfish and ludicrous as anything I've ever heard in my life.

It's about as logical as saying homosexual marriage is going to ruin straight marriage.

I suppose addicts shouldn't get methadone because that might make the wholesome heroin experience less fucking romantic for junkies.

Epic. Fail.

If you took the time to read through the thread youd see that no-one is against the idea of psychedelics being used in medical and psychiatric treatment, in fact, the general consensus is that the renewal of their use in treatment is a positive thing.

Tea's post was in reference to the idea that psychedleics could be co-opted and used as a societal pacifier, as Soma - just another theraputic method to shore up capitalist structures, not in the treatment of mental illness.

But far be it from me to co-opt your utterly predictable and reactionary bollocks though. Id save your 'epic fails' for a time when you actually read the thread in question. The irony quotient gets just to much to handle otherwise...

 

[nomadthethird]

I know all those things. In fact that means people were using psilocybin before scientists were around, depending on your definition. I suppose shamans were probably the first scientists.

You said :



Am I just being pedantic in saying that scientists didn't develop psilocybin?

(I'm all for it btw)

Wasn't the article linked to about LSD? When I said develop, I meant LSD. Most new research is with LSD, not psilocybin. When I said refined, I was thinking mostly of psilocybin and related compounds. Research isn't done using actual mushrooms... they make medical grade psilocybin for that...

 

[nomadthethird]

If you took the time to read through the thread youd see that no-one is against the idea of psychedelics being used in medical and psychiatric treatment, in fact, the general consensus is that the renewal of their use in treatment is a positive thing.

Tea's post was in reference to the idea that psychedleics could be co-opted and used as a societal pacifier, as Soma - just another theraputic method to shore up capitalist structures, not in the treatment of mental illness.

But far be it from me to co-opt your utterly predictable and reactionary bollocks though. Id save your 'epic fails' for a time when you actually read the thread in question. The irony quotient gets just to much to handle otherwise...

I did read the thread, and it was ridiculous. Mr. Tea made some good points (which is why I told him "^This"--maybe it's you who needs to read more carefully). Lanugo and Woebot said things that I think are fundamentally illogical.

Soma is used in the treatment of severe anxiety disorders, insomnia, and muscular/back pain. It's no more inherently "capitalistic" than Tylenol is. It's no more implicated in "pacifying" "society" than ibuprofen is. (Unless you're talking about fictional Soma from BNW? Yes yes, medication, it's all about pacifying rather than treating people. Tell me something I haven't heard a million times from 9th grade stoners).

I love it when people make big sweeping, generalizations about fields they know absolutely nothing about.

 

[nomadthethird]

Interesting development. However, given the amazing capacity of the capitalist system to absorb any kind of seemingly emancipatory trend in society and exploit it for its own sustenance I could imagine that a wider mainstream acceptance of hallucinogens may result in a kind of commercialisation and banalization of the psychedelic experience: epiphanies on prescription. The allowance of hallucinogenic drugs may very well be a deliberate measure of social engineering to counter wide-spread depression and unhappiness. It's perfectly practical for the powerholders that now meaning of life may be directly administered by means of pharmaceuticals. It makes perfect sense in its unsurpassable cynicism. Just think of the way everybody is hooked on "soma" in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World.

Utterly predictable. And downright ridiculous.

 

[massrock]

Soma is used in the treatment of severe anxiety disorders, insomnia, and muscular/back pain. It's no more inherently "capitalistic" than Tylenol is. It's no more implicated in "pacifying" "society" than ibuprofen is.

In your FACE, Huxley.

(yes they were talking about fictional Soma)